


Do Not Seek the Treasure

by balloonstand



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Alcohol warning, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-26
Updated: 2015-12-26
Packaged: 2018-05-09 09:47:12
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,420
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5535302
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/balloonstand/pseuds/balloonstand
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Merlin has had one too many</p>
            </blockquote>





	Do Not Seek the Treasure

**Author's Note:**

  * For [remyllian_fire](https://archiveofourown.org/users/remyllian_fire/gifts).



> For Sarah. Merry Christmas!

Merlin has had one too many.

Merlin is spilling out of his seat and into Elyan’s. Elyan is somehow using this to pick up women. Gwaine hangs around the edge of this mess, looking for scraps of attention from Elyan’s admirers. Arthur nurses his first drink and pays attention to Merlin.

He tries to remember a time when he saw Merlin drink more than one and he draws a blank. He thinks maybe he should cut Merlin off, or ask if something is wrong. He does neither.

This is the first time he has seen Merlin properly drunk. The spectacle makes him think of those slow-shutter pictures of highways, where the taillights blur into a red line but the cars themselves are invisible. Merlin is going a thousand miles an hour faster than Arthur is, leaving traces behind but nothing substantial.

He settles in to enjoy a show as Merlin tries to explain to Elyan’s cluster of admirers how far away the closest star is, but he can’t focus on Merlin’s over-earnest jumbled speech, or the indulgent smiles of the whole group around him. Something is unsettled and he realizes that he is disappointed. Merlin is making an ass of himself and Arthur should be loving this.

Arthur is a problem solver. He closes his eyes and tips more beer into himself and tries to imagine Merlin drunk, in a way that he isn’t seeing him drunk right now: Merlin would be more obnoxious. He would be embarrassing Arthur by singing along with the bar’s music, songs he shouldn’t know but somehow always does. Arthur would be getting angry and turning pink with it. Merlin can push his fucking buttons sometimes and drunk Merlin would be pressing all of them like a kid in an elevator. And he would be _loving_ it. He would be grinning at Arthur and it would make him look much too young and guileless for how plastered he was. He would be right in Arthur’s face, making sure that he was the only thing on Arthur’s mind. He would be pressing the pad of his finger into the pissed-off flush on Arthur’s cheek and asking him if he was spending too much time in the sun.

Arthur cracks an eye open. Merlin is still hanging onto Elyan, deep in his personal space. Gwaine has a hand hovering nearby, ready to catch when Merlin tips over. Arthur gets a little mad now, a little irritated.

He lets his eyes slide shut again. Merlin would get softer as he drank more. That is the missing piece of this, Arthur realizes. Merlin would be slowing down and getting gentle as he drank more. That is what is at the core of him. That strain of instinctive sweetness that other people run just a little too cold for. Arthur can picture it, Merlin should be sweetest when he was drunk and didn’t have the cognitive capacity to filter it down. Arthur knows Merlin down to his core, down to that sweetness. Merlin shouldn’t be surprising him like this and not acting the way Arthur thought he would. Arthur knows Merlin too well for that.

Someone jostles his arm and Arthur snaps his eyes open again. It wasn’t Merlin brushing against him, just someone grabbing another drink from the bar. Merlin is always half a step away from him, so it should have been Merlin, Arthur thinks. Merlin is always glued to his side and Arthur sometimes wants to shake him off, turn him out like a pebble from his shoe. Usually his whole personal space is too full of Merlin to have room for strangers bumping into his arm.

Merlin is getting another drink. He has his head at a Dutch angle as he watches the liquid fall into the glass. He sees Arthur watching him and he gives him a little smile. It’s a twitch of his lips. Arthur frowns back at him, which makes him smile a little bigger. Closer, but still not the sloppy, sunshine smile it should be.

Arthur wants to smack himself on the forehead; maybe that will pull him out of whatever this is. This overanalyzing of Merlin when he is drunk. Arthur needs to loosen his grasp on this one. He has been circling it since that fishing trip at the end of the summer.

**_____________________________**

 

One of Gwaine’s relatives, a cousin something-removed, offered them the use of his lakeside house and everyone jumped at the chance to get out of the city for a few days while the weather was still nice. Merlin had followed a day later than the rest of them. He had arrived late at night, when everyone was sitting around the fire pit out back. Arthur was alone in the house, grabbing another another beer from the kitchen when Merlin let himself in through the front door. He saw Arthur immediately. Arthur met his eye just in time to see Merlin’s face light up entirely. Everything in him switched on at once and he glowed at Arthur like stadium lights. He dropped his overnight bag at his feet and held his arms open wide for a hug, smiling open and inviting. Arthur had snorted and turned back to the task of uncapping his brew.

When he looked up to shoot off some teasing return remark, the words caught in his throat. It was like Arthur had hit the pause button on Merlin. He was frozen just where Arthur had left him. His expression was the same. He didn’t look upset, didn’t look affected. But he was tense on a cellular level and frozen with it, and Arthur had no fucking clue what he did.

Arthur hadn’t said anything, just let him play it off and keep whatever pride was important to him, but he watched him carefully for the rest of the trip. Maybe he half-noticed these things before – the long looks, he thought, he might have missed because every time he caught Merlin looking at him it was jolting – but he gave them the undivided attention of his most analytical thought process. He was a little amused at how this somehow led him to more ways of making Merlin irritated. He could just hold Merlin’s gaze instead of glancing away and Merlin would get flustered and then mad. They were watching a game on TV and Arthur lost himself deep in fascination with the creeping redness in Merlin’s cheeks; he missed what Gwaine swore was the most beautiful goal he had ever seen. Merlin started avoiding him after that. Arthur did the math on Merlin’s behavior and there was only one answer: Merlin was trying to hide something.

It delighted Arthur that there was something still in Merlin, always an open book for him, that he was trying to keep from Arthur. Something Arthur could get his hands on and puzzle out. And he absolutely adored how jumpy Merlin was now, now that he had his secret. Arthur walked up next to him one day at the lakeside. Merlin was evidently lost in thought, eyes directed sightlessly over the water. Smooth, placid surface but unknown and unseen depths; Arthur almost smiled. He did smile, and he laughed, when he took a step forward to be shoulder-to-shoulder with Merlin and Merlin jumped halfway out of his skin.

“Guilty conscience?” Arthur smirked.

Merlin swatted at him half-heartedly. “Just have some things to think about,” Merlin said loftily.

**_____________________________**

 

Arthur remembers his tone perfectly and he smiles as he thinks about it now.

**_____________________________**

 

“Just have some things to think about,” Merlin said in a tone like Arthur couldn’t possibly know what it was like to have thoughts in his head. And Arthur couldn’t even be offended because Merlin was never cheerier than when he was getting one up on Arthur.

“What things?”

Merlin looked at him thoughtfully. Arthur held his gaze, hoping to see him blush. Merlin looked away first looking more confused than embarrassed.

“Fine,” Arthur said warmly, “don’t tell me.” He turned to look toward the rest of the group, a quarter of a mile down the shoreline.

“I almost drove off the road on the way out here,” Merlin said conversationally.

“ _What?_ ” Arthur whipped around to face him. He kept his hands at his sides and bit down on a pointless _are you all right_ that he already knew the answer to. “What the hell, why didn’t you say anything?”

“I’m fine,” Merlin said. “My headlights went out for a couple of minutes-“

“I _told_ you that you had to get those fixed,” Arthur hissed.

“- and I didn’t want to stop driving because I was already late, so I just slowed down. The road curved and I would have missed it and driven straight off the cliff if someone hadn’t been driving down the other way just then.” Merlin kept talking in that calm, matter-of-fact voice that made Arthur feel like he was hiding more than he was sharing.

“Shit, Merlin,” Arthur said, too angry to say anything else. He didn’t want to shout at Merlin. He had put his hand on Merlin’s shoulder, not sure what else to do. Merlin got that same stillness to him as he had the night he arrived. He squeezed Merlin’s shoulder and let him go.

“Really, it wasn’t even close,” Merlin said. Merlin wasn’t lying to him about any of this, but he wasn’t really telling Arthur anything either. It came off flat, a half-hearted excuse.

Arthur put it from his mind as much as he could after that, but a sense of it lingered.

**_____________________________**

 

The thing is. The thing is, he likes the idea of it, Merlin with a secret. Merlin trying to keep something from him, something for him to inevitably discover. Maybe that’s what he hates now. Because now Merlin is drunk and he should be losing his grip on whatever it is, trying not tell Arthur even as he tells him everything. He only likes the idea of Merlin with a secret if Merlin lets him in on it.

When Arthur swung by Merlin’s place earlier and practically carried him to the car for a night of drinking, it had tickled at the corner of his mind that getting Merlin drunk could be a nice resolution to this secret keeping problem of his; get Merlin plastered and wait as the confessions come tumbling out. Simple. And maybe it is the expectation of exposure but Merlin seems more distant than ever. Arthur regrets inviting Elyan, but Merlin was the one who invited Gwaine so he wouldn’t have been alone with Merlin anyway. It’s not exactly the environment for-

Arthur sits up straight as though a bolt of electricity just passed through his body. He wants to expel the thought that has just crept into his mind.

**_____________________________**

 

The last night at the lake, a few more people had come up to the cabin, some of Morgana’s friends who Arthur didn’t know. It pushed them past bed capacity and Arthur had been voted into sharing. So had Merlin. Arthur hadn’t said anything, hadn’t even looked at him as they got ready for bed. Arthur had climbed into bed first, keeping well on his side of it. They had flipped a coin for the right side – the side they both preferred – and Arthur had won. Merlin lingered in the bathroom and Arthur felt irritation building in his chest. He couldn’t sleep with the lights on, and he couldn’t turn the lights off until Merlin got into bed. Arthur had grumbled until Merlin came out of the bathroom, flipped the light off, and got into bed.

Merlin tossed and turned. Arthur tensed each time he did, but Merlin never felt the need to say anything and he never encroached on Arthur’s side. He didn’t even try to steal the blankets. After a while he settled down and stopped moving. Arthur listened hard for Merlin’s breathing, trying to tell if he had fallen asleep. His breaths were too short for sleep; he was awake. Arthur stayed awake too, slightly on edge, and by the time he fell asleep, he realized that, though Arthur wouldn’t let him, he was waiting for Merlin to try to touch him.

**_____________________________**

 

It’s a similar thought that Arthur tries to clear from his mind now. Similar, only worse.

Arthur takes a long drink and to let the it burn on its way down his throat because-

Arthur wishes he hadn’t come here tonight. He puts his drink down on the bar and pushes it away from himself. He’s not even near drunk. He’ll never be able to be drunk around Merlin again now. Merlin, with everything neatly under wraps even when he’s drunk. Arthur needs to keep his head clear to keep up.

_____________________________

 

At the lake, Arthur had woken up before Merlin the next morning. He and Merlin were both still contained in their own sides of the large bed. Arthur was still laying on his side with his back to Merlin, the way he had been when he had fallen asleep. He stayed where he was and listened to Merlin’s deep and even breaths for too long. It was only when Merlin began stirring that Arthur got out of bed and went to take a shower.

This bathroom was a lot like Arthur’s at home, which is to say that it was really very nice. The shower was easily large enough to fit two people and had large glass double doors that gave Arthur a clear line of sight to his reflection in the mirror above the sink as he stood in the shower. He held his own gaze, watched his cheeks get pink from the heat, until the glass fogged up. He felt unsettled, almost guilty. His skin felt tight all over his body and the hot water and steam-

Merlin had started pounding on the door and demanding his turn in the shower. Arthur turned off the water and took his time drying off, delaying until he felt more like himself.

_____________________________

 

Arthur feels like that again, warm and unsteady and too big for his skin.

“Arthur,” Gwaine says near his ear.

Arthur starts. “What?”

“That girl has been waiting for you to hit on her for, like, fifteen minutes.” Gwaine nods toward a very pretty brunette sitting with a couple of friends at one of the tables. Arthur catches her eye and she smiles at him. Arthur smiles back reflexively. She holds up her glass and Arthur nods. He needs the distraction.

“I think she wants you to buy her a drink,” Gwaine says.

“Yeah, thanks Gwaine. I got it.” Arthur waves him off. He calls for the bartender and orders her another. He carries it over to her and her friends make themselves scarce. Arthur gets a good view of Merlin as he sets her drink down on the table. He is killing off another drink of his own and is completely oblivious to anything else. Arthur sits in one of the chairs with his back to Merlin.

He spends the next fifteen minutes filling his mind with details about her – as though that could push these other things out. He learns her name, her hometown, her dogs’ names, her favorite food and movie. He keeps his eyes trained on her and notices her hair – darker than Merlin’s and thicker too. Her eyes are a rich brown. She is beautiful and she is giving him her undivided attention. She smiles at him a lot.

Arthur smiles back and plots out the next few steps in his mind. He will take her hand across the table and rub his thumb over her knuckles. He won’t need to suggest anything, they both know why she was looking at him and why he came over; they know what this means. Arthur will tell her that she is beautiful and he’ll mean it, and she’ll smile bigger because she knows it. And he’ll kiss her then. It’s simple and it will get him laid. It has many times in the past.

An trespassing voice in his mind asks if it would be like that with Merlin. Not a chance, nothing with Merlin can be simple or straightforward. Arthur would never ask and Merlin would never answer.

_____________________________

 

He had tried to get Merlin to drive back from the lake in his car. He had done everything but carry Merlin to the car and belt him into the passenger seat. Somehow Merlin still ended up in his own car and Arthur had stayed on his tail all the way down from the mountains. He must have left himself on autopilot because he followed Merlin all the way back to his apartment before he realized it. He parked his car and jumped out to meet Merlin, like that had been his plan all along.

The planes of Merlin’s face were set in firm but tolerant lines. “What are you doing, Arthur?”

“Using your phone.”

By the time Arthur left, he had called for a tow truck and watched it take Merlin’s car to the shop to replace his headlights. Merlin complained through the whole process but didn’t ever bother getting up from the couch.

_____________________________

 

Ten seconds away from Arthur making his move and Elyan spoils it. He has one arm around a girl’s waist and the other tapping on Arthur’s shoulder.

“I’m heading out,” he says. “You need to look after Merlin.”

“Can’t Gwaine do it?”

“Do you even hear yourself?”

Arthur glances over at the girl he had been about to seal the deal with and he knows that he has lost her. She’s already scanning the bar for her friends. If Arthur goes to help his friend, she’ll think that’s sweet and she’ll be gone; if he blows off his friend to stay with her, she won’t like that and she’ll be gone. Neatly done by Elyan, even if it wasn’t on purpose. Elyan is grinning at him, fully aware that he is ruining this for Arthur.

Arthur makes his excuses and is quickly waved off. He tugs Elyan away from his girl for a second.

“What’s wrong with him?”

Elyan follows Arthur’s eyes over to Merlin. "You don't know? I thought if anyone would it would be you." Arthur _should_ but he doesn't. Elyan presses his lips together. “Not sure. He isn’t saying anything.”

“Have you ever seen him drink like this?”

“Remember that first night he showed up at Gwaine’s cousin’s lake house? He wiped us clean out of booze. I had to go into town the next day and pick more up.” Elyan makes eye contact with his hookup over Arthur’s shoulder. “Listen, let me know if he says anything. Take care of him, okay?”

Arthur walks back to the bar slowly, each step more unwilling than the last. It’s almost embarrassing dragging his feet like this. Gwaine has his arm around Merlin’s shoulder and both of them have their backs to Arthur, so neither has to see his reluctance or the way he hesitates another moment before taking the empty stool next to Gwaine instead of the one next to Merlin.

“Arthur!” Gwaine greets him happily. He puts his other arm around Arthur and pulls him in close. This brings Arthur’s head in close to Merlin’s, also being squeezed into a side hug. Arthur works his way free.

“Gwaine, d’you see those girls over there?” He doesn’t even point but Gwaine picks a direction and swivels to look.

“Yeah.”

“I heard one of them telling her friend that she thinks you’re cute.”

Gwaine beams and Arthur feels a little sorry for lying to him. He sees Merlins smiling slyly, in on the joke, and Arthur doesn’t feel sorry anymore.

“You should go talk to her,” Arthur says, looking at Merlin pressing a hand to his mouth to smother his smile. Gwaine finishes the last mouthful of his beer and slaps his hands down on the bar.

“Wish me luck.”

Arthur and Merlin twist in their seats to watch Gwaine saunter over to a group of women and slide into an empty seat. Arthur can’t hear what he says, but the whole group bursts into laughter and Gwaine throws Arthur and Merlin a large wink. Arthur smiles and shakes his head.

“You didn’t hear her say that, did you?” Merlin asks thickly, the alcohol weighing his speech down.

Arthur grins at him in answer and Merlin throws his head back to laugh. Arthur’s smile fades a bit because it’s somehow not his normal laugh. Arthur wishes he could explain it away as intoxication, but he thinks there is something else to it. Arthur looks back at Gwaine, who is stacking empty glasses into unstable looking pyramids. “He’s doing all right though,” he says.

“Better than you,” Merlin says. Arthur follows Merlin’s eye to the girl he had been flirting with earlier, before Elyan had sent him back to Merlin. She is back with her friends and she waves at Arthur when she catches him watching. Arthur waves back, and so does Merlin.

“That’s your fault, not mine,” Arthur says. There is still an empty barstool between them where Gwaine had been sitting. Arthur hits it with his foot as he shifts in his seat. It makes a scraping sound across the floor when Arthur kicks it and Merlin glances down at it but he still doesn’t sit on it.

“How?” Merlin asks

“I was in, but Elyan sent me back over here to look after you.” Arthur hopes Merlin takes this chance to tell him what the hell is going on with him. Maybe he’ll start talking and be unable to stop, spill everything to Arthur the way he should.

Merlin looks furious for a moment but it morphs into something else and when he speaks he’s teasing. “It’s always excuses with you.”

“I was a minute away from going home with her,” Arthur insists, and it’s true. “She kept saying I have a great smile,” he adds and that isn’t. Merlin snorts and Arthur bristles. “I have a great smile. I have a _great_ smile,” he repeats, not sure what he’s doing. He wants to hear Merlin say he has a great smile. All the times Merlin has made the effort to get Arthur to smile, he has to think that it’s a great smile. _I know you_ , Arthur thinks. _No matter how strange you’re being tonight or that you won’t tell me your stupid secret I know you. Say you like my smile_.

“Don’t I?” Arthur says.

Merlin looks down into his empty cup. “I think your smile is kind of stupid actually,” he says, the slur in his voice more pronounced than it was a minute ago.

“It’s great,” Arthur says.

“It’s all right,” Merlin says, looking around. “Did you see where Gwaine went?”

“Christ, Merlin,” Arthur snaps. “Just say you like it.” He wants to swallow those words but they’re already out of his mouth. Merlin focuses on Arthur for what feels like the first time all night, surprise sharp on his face. Arthur flushes hot and ducks his head. He is grateful all over again that he is sober because he feels out of control as it is.

“I like your smile,” Merlin says quietly.

Arthur puffs out a breath. “Thanks.” A desperate, last-hope kind of thought occurs to him. “How drunk are you?” _Are you going to remember this tomorrow, me making an ass of myself?_ And apparently Merlin knows him better than he knows Merlin these days because Merlin hears the unasked question. He shrugs and smiles apologetically.

_____________________________

 

Merlin had filled Arthur’s phone with texts complaining that the new headlights for his car were too bright and too white, instead of yellow like his old ones. Arthur had gotten all the texts at once when he turned his phone back on after a meeting. Arthur took it as a _thank you_ and sent back _you’re welcome_. When Merlin hadn’t texted again by the time Arthur got home, he called him.

Merlin sounded like he was on a different continent, not just a few blocks away.

“Do you really hate having a working car that much?”

“It worked just fine.”

“Except for the part where you almost drove off a cliff.”

Merlin was silent and Arthur was surprised. He hadn’t thought he was crossing any lines. Merlin had told him about that himself. The first tendril of uneasiness unfurled itself in Arthur’s stomach, the first sense that something was off with Merlin – with Merlin and him – and Arthur needed to know what it was.

_____________________________

 

Arthur gets up and his legs feel shaky. He wonders if maybe he is drunk and just too drunk to remember that he drank. But he is sober and he knows it. Stone cold, stupid sober. Shit.

“I think I’m going to leave,” Arthur says. He was Merlin’s ride to the bar and it doesn’t look like he’ll be taking Merlin back. “Do you- need a ride?”

Merlin shakes his head. “I can walk.”

Normally Arthur would argue, tell Merlin to stop being stubborn and just get a ride home with him. Normally Arthur doesn’t tell Merlin to compliment his smile, though. Normally he feels like he knows Merlin down to his bones, knows everything there is to know about him.

“All right,” Arthur says. “I guess,” he clears his throat, “I guess I’ll see you later.” He doesn’t wait for an answer, just walks out of the bar to his car. He starts the car and drives home, trying not to think about anything at all. He can feel the intrusive thoughts pressing in, but he carefully does not think them.

_____________________________

 

He lays in bed the next morning. He isn’t hungover, which is the final proof that he was not drunk the night before.

It’s absurd, longing for something he doesn’t even want. He needs to straighten himself out. Shit, he needs to at least get his head above water on this. He can’t expel the thought though, can’t unknown the fact that he wanted Merlin to make a move on him last night. It wasn’t that he wanted Merlin. He wouldn’t have- he doesn’t think he would have let him. But he had been so sure, somehow, that it was coming.

He checks his phone. He has a few texts, none from Merlin. He rubs his hand over his face. He isn’t sure what Merlin remembers from last night and he doesn’t know what to say to him. _Sorry I lost my mind, Merlin, but if you had just done what I thought you would do I would have been ready for it, so really, it’s not my fault_.

He turns his phone off and goes to take a shower. Just before he gets in, he turns his phone back on. Still no word from Merlin. Arthur can wait for Merlin to reach out to him first. That way he’ll know how much Merlin remembers.

He gets in the shower and leans his head against the tiled wall. He relives every moment of the previous night and his agitation grows. It was like a nightmare in which everything just familiar enough to recognize but disconcertingly alien. And he felt like he was the strangest piece of it all. 

If he is honest- no, he hasn't been dishonest with himself. He just hasn't been willing. If he is willing maybe he can name these things in himself. Maybe he can think about Merlin's lips and the countless times he has noticed them for no particular reason. Maybe he can think about Merlin's hands. Maybe he can think about holding Merlin close to his body and feeling his heart beat against his chest. Maybe he can acknowledge the fact that he would have let Merlin kiss him, would have taken him out of the bar and into his bed. He can’t think of the act – can't claim the thought as his own – but he can think of his clothes on the ground, tangled with Merlin’s. He can think of a dent in the bed where- He can think of more than that, but he doesn’t have the chance.

His landline starts ringing and Arthur jumps out to answer it. It isn't Merlin.

_____________________________

 

Three days later and no word from Merlin. Arthur is past the limit of his patience, and creeping up on the limit of his sanity. Arthur throws his car into park. He jumps out and stalks into the tropical fish store where Merlin has been working in between jobs. He hopes Merlin is actually working here today or he is going to surprise the shit out of Gaius.

The store is sweltering and slightly damp. It takes a minute for Arthur’s eyes to adjust from the sunlight outside to the dim light inside coming mostly from the aquarium lights. It is a bit claustrophobic in there and Arthur squeezes between two tanks of blue and yellow fish. There is no one at the register when he gets there so he dings the bell.

“Just a moment,” Merlin’s voice comes from somewhere across the store.

“Where are you?”

“Arthur?”

“Obviously. Jump up and down so I can see you.”

Merlin sticks a hand up high enough and Arthur finds him stacking things under a row of aquariums.

“What is it?” Merlin says, straightening up when he sees Arthur.

Arthur opens and shuts his mouth. Merlin raises his eyebrows. Arthur shifts uncomfortably. Merlin begins stacking things again.

“I _am_ sorry,” Arthur says.

“For what?”

This is the problem. “Everything,” Arthur says, cheating.

Merlin stops stacking and sighs. When he meets Arthur’s eye, his expression is rather painful to look at. All open vulnerability and regret. “You don’t have to apologize, Arthur. It’s a relief that you know, honestly, I was just surprised when you, you know, brought it up.”

Arthur takes a physical and mental step back. “Wait, what?”

Merlin frowns at him. “What what?”

“What do I know?”

“What?”

“You just said-“ Arthur steps forward. “It’s a relief that I know what?”

Merlin gapes at him. “You’re really going to…. The lake, the first night I got there.”

“When you tried to hug me?” Arthur wrinkles his face in confusion.

Merlin looks down, shame-faced. “I’m sorry, Arthur. But it’s better that you know, don’t you think?”

Arthur’s mouth drops open. “I can’t believe,” he chokes out after a minute, “that you think trying to hug me was a clear romantic confession. Merlin, I had no fucking clue.”

“But- you knew. You kept looking at me the whole trip, you kept teasing me about it. You knew.”

“Merlin, I didn’t know.”

Merlin opens his mouth, then closes it and shakes his head. “Doesn’t matter, I guess. You know now.”

“Yeah,” Arthur says slowly, “I do.”

He leans in and presses his hand against Merlin’s cheek. He rubs his thumb along Merlin’s cheekbone and Merlin’s eyes widen. His lips part, but not to say anything. Arthur leans in further and Merlin is the one who closes the distance between them. It is a soft kiss. Arthur brings his other hand up to cup Merlin’s face and pull him even closer and the kiss is no longer so soft, but still perfect. Merlin clutches at Arthur’s side and that is perfect too.

The bell at the register dings faintly across the room.

“Excuse me? Is there anyone working here?” someone calls out.

“Ignore it,” Arthur whispers.

“Yeah right,” Merlin whispers back. “I’ll be right there,” he calls louder to the customer. He kisses Arthur again, quick and casual but it gets Arthur's heart pounding like it was a grope. It is so fitting, so _right_ that Merlin kisses him like that. “Pick me up after work.”

“What time?”

“You don’t know what time I get off of work?”

“I’m kidding,” Arthur says. He wasn’t, but he’d figure it out. Merlin gives him one more smile, big and clear and bright. When he is out of sight, Arthur touches his lip with the tips of his fingers. He lingers like that until he can hear Merlin helping the customer find the right fish food. He saunters out, catches Merlin’s eye and smiles at him. Merlin reddens a little and focuses his attention on his customer. Arthur is grinning as he walks out of the store to his car.

Shit, he has to get things ready for tonight. What is he going to do with Merlin now?


End file.
